Potential & Purpose (6) Discovering Yours

Have you discovered your talent?

Have you discovered your gift?

You are born with your potential (gift, talent). It’s your purpose (Why am I here?) you must discover. If you discover it early, you will profit early in life. If you discover it later in life, you will profit later in life. If you never discover it, you will never profit from it. The good part is, it’s never too late to discover your purpose.

Let’s look at Moses. Everyone knows about Moses and the Red Sea, but God did not choose Moses just so he could be remembered by the parting of the Red Sea. God chose Moses because of his leadership potential and his humble spirit (Exod. 2:10, 3:1). When God called Moses to lead the Nation of Israel out of Egypt (Ex. 3:10) Moses said, "Lord, who am I that I should go unto Pharaoh….” (Ex. 3:11)? And he was right to ask that question, who was he? He was a shepherd. He had fled Egypt forty years ago. Since that time, he had gotten married, had children and was working for his father-in-law tending sheep. He was an eighty-year-old shepherd.

Who would have expected an 80-year-old shepherd to lead a chosen people into their promised land? Well, guess what? God knew Moses was more than capable of getting the job done. He knew Moses knew how to lead because Moses knew how to follow. He followed God’s every command. Moses was also very humble. If you’ve never taken care of sheep, don’t feel like you’ve missed something, you haven’t, because you have taken care of somebody in your life. Taking care of anything living, requires patience. Even waiting for a plant to grow takes time. I recently saw a sweet potato plant that had been sitting in water since March of this year. It's now June. The sweet potato plant had vines growing up the window. In fact, the teacher who used it to teach science to her first grade students was trimming it down to take some home with her. Do you know how excited those first graders were to see that plant growing? It didn’t happen overnight. It took time. Taking care of any living thing takes time to see it grow. So Moses was taking care of his father-in-law’s sheep. This was an all day job.

Do you think Moses thought in forty years he would be returning to Egypt to see Pharaoh (his foster brother) and leave with more than 3 million Israelites? People who had been enslaved in Egypt for more than 400 years. Oh well! Go figure! Nah, he didn’t know the plan God had for his life. He didn't even know God had a plan for his life. At least not at that time. None of us know until God reveals it.

You see every invention known to man comes to that individual through God. Health, wealth and knowledge come from God’s divine intervention into the life of His people. God gives gifts. A perfected gift is skill. Perfected skill brings profit. That is your talent. From that talent, wealth is obtained. Let’s look at the Bible again.

In the Gospel according to St. Matthew, (25:15-28) St. Mark and Luke, there is a story about talents. A master desired to travel and chose to leave his three servants with a portion of his wealth. He didn’t tell them how to take care of his wealth; he just told them to take care of it. You know, when your mom or dad tells you to just get the house cleaned. Same concept. So the story goes, he gave one servant one piece of land. He gave the second servant two portions of the land and to the third, he gave five portions of the land. So he goes off on his journey. Upon his return, he calls his servants into him to find out did his wealth prosper? The one with five portions of land had doubled the master’s wealth. The one with two portions of land had doubled his master’s wealth. The master was quite pleased with the two of them. When he got to the one he had given one portion of his land, he asked, “and what have you done, servant?” and the servant answered, “Master, I buried your gift in the ground because I know you are a shrewd master and I didn’t want to get in trouble with you if I misused your talent" (Matt. 25:24). The master was so furious with this servant; he took his talent from him and gave it to the one with ten talents. The unwanted servant left his master with a sad countenance.

The point is, if you choose to bury your talent, you will receive nothing, and you will be cast out. If you choose to double or even triple your talent, God will increase your worth. Those who discover this principle early enough and develop it lead a very productive life. We call them successful. Now, I didn’t come up with this on my own, God gave me this revelation. Through this revelation, God showed me how to walk in His Word and discover the keys to life through your relationship with Him and your fellowman.

Are you using your talent or gift?

Comments 1 comment

ZoeQuester 5 years ago

At the end of the day, it is God (and His power) alone who deserves to be remembered (and talked about) every time people hear about the Red Sea. We are all but humble instruments; we must decrease and He must increase.

Potential is not dependent on how and what we see on ourselves. It all rests on who we are in God's sight, in spite of what we or others see (or not see) in us, all by God's grace. Our potential to give God greatest glory, His way, can only be maximized if we die to our own selves (self-reliance and self-interests) and let Him have His way in us, through us, and in spite of us.